Princess Margaret letter changes how we view her life

Newly discovered letter may put to rest the mistaken opinion that she chose to
put the privileges of being a royal princess before everything else.

Neither Princess Margaret nor Peter Townsend chose to reveal the full story of their relationship.Photo: GETTY IMAGES

By Christopher Warwick

10:00PM GMT 07 Nov 2009

I first met Princess Margaret in the summer of 1980 and I knew her until she died 22 years later. During countless conversations with her, as her authorised biographer, I discovered that while she would often be disarmingly open and forthcoming on many aspects of her life, her relationship with Group Captain Peter Townsend was not going to be one of them. Despite its undeniable significance, it was not something she was prepared to talk about, not even with her closest friends. The last of my attempts to draw her further on the subject was firmly rebuffed when, in a tone that meant 'drop it', she said: "It was a long time ago and I have forgotten it. It was all over and done with."

Thus, while both had the opportunity to do so, neither Princess Margaret nor Peter Townsend chose to reveal the full story of their relationship and how and why it ended. In 1978, Townsend provided a partial account in his autobiography Time and Chance; while for her part, the Princess came up with a story that she resolutely stuck to, even choosing in later years, and for reasons best known to herself, to demonise Sir Alan 'Tommy' Lascelles, the Queen's first private secretary, as 'the man who ruined [her] life'.

What Princess Margaret did tell me - and, indeed, she said much the same thing to the distinguished historian and biographer, Elizabeth Longford - was that "Had he [Lascelles] said we couldn't get married, we wouldn't have thought any more about it, but nobody bothered to explain anything to us." At the time it seemed to me an extraordinary claim for the Princess to have made, and we now know that far from keeping her in the dark, Lascelles clearly outlined the obstacles to her. In return she sent him a note of thanks.

Two things make the newly-disclosed letter Princess Margaret wrote to prime minister Anthony Eden in August 1955 surprising and significant. First, it disproves her story that nobody explained the situation to her. Second, it suggests – perhaps unsurprisingly, given the time they had spent apart – that, contrary to everything we had been led to believe, she was no longer certain about her feelings for Townsend.

In that highly confidential letter - which, although unlikely, she may have thought would never be made public - she told Eden: "It is only by seeing him that I feel I can properly decide whether I can marry him or not."

The letter also dispels the doubts some of us felt following the release of documents in 2004, by making clear that Princess Margaret was aware that the government was paving the way for a marriage if she and Townsend wanted it. In addition, and no less important, the latest papers confirm that had the couple married, the Princess would have been required to surrender nothing more than her right of succession to the throne. She would have retained her style and rank of Royal Highness together with her Civil List annuity. That may at last put to rest the often-voiced but mistaken opinion that she chose to put the privileges of being a royal princess before everything else.

Christopher Warwick is the author of Princess Margaret: A Life of Contrasts (André Deutsch, revised 2002)